born Sept. 17, 1939, Melrose, Mass., U.S.
U.S. jurist.
He graduated from Harvard Law School and soon joined the New Hampshire attorney general's office. He was promoted to state attorney general in 1976, to the state's Superior Court in 1978, and to its Supreme Court in 1983. In 1990 he was appointed by Pres. George Bush to the First U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and later that year to the U.S. Supreme Court . Considered a conservative at the outset of his appointment, he gradually emerged as a moderate liberal, particularly on issues of civil rights.